Don’t act like you don’t want to be here Ezme, you’re clearly enjoying yourself.
[Phlink!]
Ezme was brought out of her thoughts, when the impact of a conjured projectile bounced against her armor. Her armor didn’t crack nor did it hurt her much, as her active body enhancement kept her body from being crushed.
It had the same appearance as the one Alarice was using. Except it looked more clunky, although well fitted to Ezme’s body. It lacked the graceful and well-fitting appearance that Alarice’s armor did on her. Ezme was a rank and file angel after all.
I need to focus.
Ezme focused her divine power into her wings, creating a sonic boom when she flapped her wings, pushing the air as she launched into a new direction.
The angel flew through a plume of black smoke, rising from a burning house below her to gain some distance from her pursuers.
The battle had been going on for days. The mortals in the city had fled long before, only the rear guard were present to guard their back. Who still numbered in the tens of thousands.
Coming out of the smoke she gripped her halberd tighter, separating a demon’s head from it’s shoulders in her swift passing.
Although angels could theoretically fight forever with the prayers they received, they still suffered from fatigue.
Their physical bodies would begin complaining and become slower. And the mental strain was even worse, even if they fell into a trance while fighting. For when they noticed that the strike they thought would kill an enemy didn’t do so, they had to focus their mind on pushing the body.
In that sense, they were like mortals, even if their bodies could be discarded. But creating a new body was no easy task, which put them out of the battlefield. Where they were needed.
Ezme turned her head to look back at her pursuers.
These demons looked like human sized insects. Black exoskeleton, four legs and two arms with barbs along their forearms that lead to the spike after the wrist. And four large transparent wings.
Ezme spotted an intact dwelling and landed on the pointed roof to face the demons chasing her. There were hundreds, but they were swarming after her in a drawn out cluster. She wouldn’t stay long. Deflect the first. Cleave the second. Then the rest should be close enough.
Holy Fire!
Ezme’s weapon ignited in white flames.
The closest demons’ forearms began to glow with a blue hue as they made their final approach. A quick step to the side combined with a thrust with her halberd made the demon’s empowered slash fall short. Ezme let her weapon follow back over her head as the demon changed the weapon's direction as it tumbled past the roof, ignited in flames.
Ezme immediately pulled her halberd in an overhead swing, down onto the next demon’s shoulder as the demon’s thrusting limbs failed in reaching her.
Leaning back while extending her wings she looked up at the approaching swarm, meters away from her as she cancelled Holy Fire.
Shocking Wings!
Ezme’s body was forced to follow the movement of the divine skill she activated. Her wings flapped forward, faster than mortal eyes could follow as a sonic boom resounded through the desolate city. At the same time the roof under her armored feet collapsed, making her fall through it as the mass of her body suddenly increased.
Surprised at the unexpected outcome, she instinctively extended her wings. However the hole was too small to let her wings through, effectively catching her.
But now she was stuck, hanging down through the roof.
Crap! I forgot mortal houses are fragile!
Looking down into the house, she could see some of the mortal soldiers giving eachother emergency treatment. They were staring up at her, jaws gaping.
Crap!! They saw me!
With cheeks burning with embarrassment her hands instantly went up to grab the edges of the hole and pulled herself up.
She quickly extended her wings and looked towards the demons that had been sent tumbling back by the shockwave her Shocking Wings had created. But any time she had gained was instantly lost as she made her miscalculation. They were already about to come at her as a swarm again.
Crap!!! I hope they don’t realize there were mortals here!
Ezme took flight, slowly at first to make the demons follow after her. She dodged several projectiles as she picked up speed and rose towards the sky. Ezme didn’t look back if the demons noticed the mortals inside or not.
[Ezme, it’s lovely that you can find the time to mess around. That means you can collect more demons.](???)
Crap! He saw me too!
[I’m at my limit already! I wasn’t messing around!](Ezme)
[Hold out a little longer. Alarice is on her way.](???)
[You’ve been saying that for two days Cato!](Ezme)
[Alarice just contacted me, she’s defeated the demon lord to the north and is now heading here.](Cato)
[...Fine!](Ezme)
Ezme flapped her wings faster as she was crossing the path of another angel. He too was followed by a swarm of demons. Ezme pointed her free palm behind her brother.
Shockwave!
Ezme drew in her wings and twirled to avoid the tumbling demons that were crashing into each other. The ones affected by the shockwave, and those following behind them, changed targets to chase after her.
When extending her wings she looked back. There were thousands of them now.
My brother can get more now. He’s only got a few after him.
Ezme rapidly beat her wings to gain the altitude she lost when dodging the demons.
[Siblings, Alarice is now preparing for the final approach. Make a final round to draw in the demons.](Cato)
Ezme turned towards the edge of the city to look for more demons to collect. I won’t go very far. If Alarice is already approaching I can’t risk losing my tail now.
Spotting a group of demons, Ezme ascended further. Once gaining altitude she drew her wings in again to gain velocity and approached them in a twisting curve as she descended. Ezme activated her body enhancement skill and swung her weapon as she poured divine power into it when passing.
[Blade Extension!]
[Phlink!]
A demon successfully got in a strike on her armor-covered torso. The strike had been hard - hard enough to crack her ribs.
In return Ezme had cut three demons with her swing.
A few dozen joined her swarm as she began flapping her wings again, ignoring the pain in her chest.
[Alarice has begun her final approach. Bring them in and prepare to disperse.](Cato)
Ezme tilted her wings to turn towards the city center. She flew slowly, without letting the demons catch up to her, for she knew it would get crowded and chaotic if they had to keep the dozen swarms of incoming demons occupied in too close proximity to each other.
Ezme arrived at the centermost district of the city and began flying around it. She could see her siblings all arrive one by one, demons in tow as they flew around in random patterns.
She didn’t have to wait long for the final order.
[Disperse!](Cato)
As soon as Ezme got the order, she filled her wings with divine power and broke the sound barrier when she beat her wings. Within a second she was outside the city, within two passing over a forest. After a third second she stopped and turned to look back.
Ezme could see the swarms of demons swirling around above the city. They had already begun to disperse and spread out over the city.
Ezme thought went to the mortals still left in the city. She had tried not to think about them, but she knew this would be happening before she even arrived. Now the tears couldn’t be held back any further.
May your next lives be ones in peace, brave mortals. I will not forget your sacrifices.
Six seconds had passed since Ezme stopped far from the city when a blinding second sun appeared in the bright sky.
The next second the giant, dome-shaped wall of white fire reached the city, reducing it to rubble. Ezme watched the resulting shockwave of air flatten the trees as it approached her in silence.
_____________________________
“You wasted your strength again, didn’t you?”(Alarice)
The first words Alarice spoke to Ezme as she arrived at the crater in the center of the ruined city didn’t lift her mood.
“I-I know.” Ezme responded with an inclined head.
“Ezme did well Alarice. A few mistakes aside.”(Cato)
“What is ‘a few’?”(Alarice)
“...Alright, but the point is that she’s improving.”(Cato)
“She needs to improve faster, or else she’ll come to regret it. Soon.”(Alarice)
“Certainly, but she’s on the right path. You don’t-... ”(Cato)
[Ezme, I miss yoouu. Come back to meee.](Amara)
Ezme’s face flushed at the voice in her head. Once again she was reminded that she had to tell Amara that she was using telepathy unconsciously. It had been fun listening to it at first, but when Alarice had come to fetch Ezme she realised it was inappropriate. She deserved to know that sometimes her thoughts were leaking.
“...-me. Ezme!”(Alarice)
“Eh? Yes?”(Ezme)
“Who were you talking to?”(Alarice)
“I-I wasn’t talking to anyone!”(Ezme)
“It was the mortal, I see. Who else could it have been.” Alarice sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“I-I’m sorry. I only received-.”(Ezme)
[Ezmeee. I’m bored without youu.](Amara)
“Hmm. I see. You need to tell her to seal her thoughts. I receive messages on occasion as well.”(Alarice)
Ezme looked up with large eyes. “You do?”
“Yes. That impudent mortal seemingly likes to call me names.” Alarice sighed.
the elves world(which i assume i one of amaras) would likely go the biopunk route instead of the cyberpunk dwarves if there are any would likely be a forge world
Why are they fighting demons here? I thought there was an armistice?
Good question! That would be because the armistice only affects a certain number of worlds. The war will still continue on other fronts.
Thanks for the chapter !
"Her armor didn’t crack nor did it hurt her much, as her body was divine body enhancement kept her body from being crushed."
==>The second half of the sentence really bothers me ... "as her body was divine body enhancement kept her body from being crushed" ... Maybe you're just missing either a coma or an "and" after "divine" ? "as her body was divine and body enhancement kept her body from being crushed" (maybe/dunno)
"Coming out of the smoke gripped her halberd tighter, separating a demon’s head from it’s shoulders in her swift passing."
==> This time it's the first half that bothers me ... Maybe "she gripped" or "gripping" (maybe dunno) ?
"She quickly extended her wings and looked around. The demons that had been sent tumbling back by the shockwave her Shocking Wings had created."
==> So this time either fuse the two sentences together with maybe a "towards" or add something at the end of the second sentence to make sense ? Because if you keep it that way, the way the second sentence is written it feels like there's something missing at the end or that the sentence is cut short. (maybe dunno)
"A demon got in strike in her armor-covered torso."
==> "successfully got in a strike on" or maybe just add an "a" between "in" and "strike", also I dunno if "on" would be better than the second "in". (maybe dunno)
"She flew slowly, without leting the demons catch up to her"
==> letting
"I will not forget your sacrifice."
==> sacrifices ? (maybe dunno)
The whole chapter kinda felt like they were pulling aggro and kiting mobs so that their mage could aoe ... are they exp grinding ahah ?
Thank you!
"Yeah! I was being used as BAIT!" (Ezme)
"We all have our roles." (Cato)
@hauntedwritings Thank you for always taking the time to read and consider my suggestions.
"Ezme focused her divine power into her wings, flapping her wings once a sonic boom as the air was pushed when she launched into a new direction."
==> I feel like a word is missing after "once", maybe a "making" or "creating".
"Their physical bodies would begin complaining, become slower."
==> I would probably either replace the comma by an "and" or change "become" for "becoming" (or you can keep it that way dunno)
"They were already about come at her as a swarm again."
==> Missing a "to" after "about".
@Ahrina Ahem. Embarassing as I 'fixed' the last suggestion recently.
"AAhahahahaah!" (Ezme)
Your suggestions are stated with intent to improve the story. Why wouldn't I consider them?
"Hear! Hear!" (Amara)
There are two forms of government I believe would fits her goals and skill set they are technocracy and cyberocracy neither is used in the real world and are theoretically forms of government in large part because there quite different then any exhausting government making changing over to it diffulcult
The form of government Amara will establish, if any, will be a subject of it's own in the far future.
The rules of the game state that they are 'free to rule themselves', i.e. Amara is not allowed to 'rule' over them in the litteral sense. Not until she wins. We'll see if she even wants to.
"Hell no! I've got enough problems people want me to miracle-fix already!"(Amara)
@hauntedwritings Hence why those two she doesn’t need to re them for those to work technocrat is putting the foremost expert of the task in question in charge of it and cyberocracy is a really recent concept and requires computer and a functioning network for it to work even better if there’s AI’s involved
At this point, there's just a subset of readers waiting for her to go down the hyper technology route. Demon Lord gets to have a large army? Eat Kinetic Bombardment, Mass Drivers, and Railguns.
"This! Why can't you steal me something like this!"(Amara)
"Cause it breaks the rules!"(Ezme)
"Dammit!"(Amara)
@hauntedwritings There's only rules about direct involvement. Nothing said about indirect, no matter *how much that may be*. Have the mouthpeice start a technological hyper-revolution based on her knowledge of Physics. 10,000 years is a long time to improve technology. Even if Earth can't currently build full railguns nor coilguns, that's still the full length of humanity's history on Earth to improve what'd likely take a few decades at least.
@KatherineFtw Aye. However, we will see that things won't be as easy for Amara.
A thing worth noting, this story is not designed to end after the battle with the demon lord. Observant readers might piece together the clues for the sequel.
Small note; a thousand years until the battle. And remember, Amara's level of knowledge of physics is considered 'a bit above average' in the modern world. And she's not a genious among geniouses. Currently, anyway.
"Who you calling average, huh?! Who do you think you are! You wait for it, I'll show you!"(Amara)
@hauntedwritings Not sure how relevant it is now but seeing this response the natural solution would probably be to teach the scientific method as it is a way to iteratively converge on a more accurate model of the way things work and why. What knowledge is colloquially referred to as "Science" is not really accurate so much as the best iterative model that is convergent towards "truth"/reality.
The real questions should be what is the way to maximize the rate of convergence while minimizing errors. If she can quickly establish such a process even if it is fairly close to the starting point it would still likely be sufficient time as pretty much all the rapid development has been in just the last few hundred years (depending on where you want to consider the starting point. The broad principal basics thus ought to be enough to cut the amount of iterative evolution needed in the system as the initial conditions will be far closer to the convergent solution provided mistakes were not made.
This is probably overthinking this but its a pet Peeve of mine that the current iteration of scientific models is treated as fact when it is effectively a single timestep in an iterative process that asymptotically approaches fact/truth.
@Dragrath An excellent suggestion, and still highly relevant at the time of writing this. Amara will most likely consider something along these lines as well to a certain degree, as she observes the mortals and plans for how to prepare.
I think today's scientic models are treated as true because, for the most part, they can be treated as true for the intents and purposes of everyone but the highest levels of research. But as you say it's important to keep in mind since those who do that research require funding, which they only get if public opinion views it as necassary.
@hauntedwritings Yep that reasoning is likely partly true however it is still dangerous as there is always the very real risk that bias can managed to slip into the body of knowledge potentially leading us astray blinding us to possibilities outside our preconceived notions recognizing and correcting these biases is a very important part of the scientific method and certainly not straight forward as multiple models can produce similar and perhaps even identical observational/experimental results while pointing in very different directions theoretically. Right now we are in a very rapid period of scientific progress in several fields astrophysics molecular biology quantum information and quantum metrology are particularly rapidly developing areas of study. For instance in geology plate tectonics is still relatively recent only really gaining acceptance in the 1960's as sea floor mapping finally revealed the mechanisms of continental drift and helping to resolve long standing mysteries about the character of the Earth's surface.
Plus there is the unfortunate fact that people scientists included not only have our own biases but can be quite stubborn to change. There is unfortunately very real truth to the whole notion that science advanced one funeral at a time because some people get so enraptured with their pet theories that they stick to them even when evidence points against them. Just look at how Super symmetry and string theory built on top of it have continued on sheer inertia even after the LHC killed off the more promising models that could have had significant explanatory power. What the observations say and how to interpret those observations are very different things.